Alabama

From TV detective to criminal defendant: New details emerge in Huntsville fraud case

In a span of 13 years, former actor Sean DeCambra went from playing a TV detective in Hollywood to being a real criminal defendant in Madison County.

Sean DeCambraMadison County Jail

DeCambra, 40, is charged along with two other suspects in a Huntsville stolen identities case. They are accused of squatting in a $500,000 home that authorities have called a "forgery and fake ID factory."

In 2004, DeCambra starred as Detective Ashley Johnson in eight episodes of NBC's "Hawaii," which aired for one season, said defense attorney Patrick Hill.

New details about DeCambra's own identity, including his past as an actor and his membership with the Screen Actors Guild, were revealed during a prelimary hearing that began Tuesday afternoon and continued today in District Judge Claude Hundley's courtroom.

DeCambra, a native of Hawaii, attended Washington State University on a football scholarship in the '90s, Hill said. DeCambra was listed as a wide receiver on the school's 1996 team.

DeCambra also played uncredited roles during the 2000s in "The Shaggy Dog," "Tides of War" and "Lost," according to the Internet Movie Database.

During this week's hearing, Judge Hundley determined the prosecution has established probable cause for charging DeCambra with first-degree trafficking in stolen identities, a Class B felony. That means the case will be forwarded to a grand jury, which will be tasked with determining whether there is enough evidence for the case to proceed to trial.

That win for the prosecution also came with a victory for the defense that could allow DeCambra to be released on bail because one of the charges was dropped.

80 trash bags of evidence

A sheriff's investigator testified Tuesday afternoon that authorities found 80 trash bags worth of evidence in the Huntsville home DeCambra shared with two other suspects in the case.

Authorities discovered what's been described as a "forgery and fake ID factor" in the upscale home at 5 Elm Ridge Boulevard when deputies went to serve eviction papers last August.

The evidence includes people's names, social security numbers, addresses, dates of birth, phone numbers, email addresses, tax forms, pell grant documents, credit and debit cards, and driver license numbers, Investigator Roland Campos testified. Campos told the judge that 58 of the 90 social security numbers were found to belong to real children younger than 12.

Most of the information was found in mail that was listed under the names investigators discovered, but it was all sent to the Huntsville home, Campos testified.

The pell grant information was found to be associated with the University of Alabama in Huntsville and other colleges in California, the investigator testified.

The addresses are from places all around the country, while the drivers licenses are from Alabama and two other states, Campos told the judge.

Other items seized from the home include 17 or 18 phones, five or six portable hard drives, three computers and photographic equipment, according to Campos' testimony.

Under cross examination by the defense, Campos testified that the evidence and property found in the home were in the bedrooms of Miles Tibbs and his brother Monualdai Tibbs, who are the other suspects in the case. Some evidence, Campos testified, was found in common areas, like the kitchen and living rooms.

While prosecutors are asserting DeCambra was actively involved in trafficking the names and other identifying information, the defense is painting the suspect as a man who was just trying to conduct business with the wrong people.

"He just found himself in a bad situation," Hill told AL.com this morning after the hearing.

One victory for prosecutors

Hill argued Hundley should not ruled the prosecution had enough evidence against DeCambra because the suspect hadn't been specifically linked to any of the incriminating documents and because authorities haven't proven that DeCambra did not have permission to have the alleged victims' information.

Hill told the judge the burden of proof was being shifted from prosecutors to the defense because they would have to show that documents weren't fraudulently taken from victims.

Hundley sided with Assistant District Attorney Jeff McCluskey, who argued the case for the prosecution.

When authorities served a search warrant at the house, they also seized a briefcase from a van in the driveway. That briefcase contained a laptop that had multiple primary users, including DeCambra, a district attorney's office investigator testified.

On that laptop, more personal information was found, but it couldn't be conclusively determined which user saved, created or viewed the documents, according to court testimony.

Another primary user, DeCambra's girlfriend, hadn't been on the sheriff's office radar as a suspect, Campos testified.

Hill said the girlfriend is employed in some capacity to work with unemployment compensation claims, which would give her access to information like what was found on the computer and in the house.

A defense win

Prosecutors dropped a second charge that DeCambra faced. He had been held without bail on a Class C felony possession of a forged instrument charge. DeCambra's bond had been revoked on that charge because he left Alabama while released on bail.

Now, DeCambra is eligible for bail on the trafficking charge, if he can show the judge that he's not a flight risk. That would mean providing an address where he will live while out on bail and possibly agreeing to wear a GPS monitoring device. He also would have to post a $15,000 bond.